


Olympus Falling

by orphan_account



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: The Original Series
Genre: Canon Typical Vulcan Emotionalism, Canon-Typical Behavior, Character Study, I hope y'all can tell how much I love these characters, Novel, Spock-centric, T'hy'la, War Crimes, Work In Progress, by the way, mental manipulation
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-25
Updated: 2020-02-25
Packaged: 2021-02-28 07:40:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,555
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22890112
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: The USS Calliope has reemerged 10 years after it was mysteriously lost, its crew complement abandoned to die in space. Few survived, and with no clues and no trails, the Calliope was lost to not-so-distant legend. Until it reappears at the edge of Earth's solar system during a meeting between Starfleet brass and bridge command.Captain Kirk, Spock, and the entire crew of the Enterprise are launched into a mystery that has occupied the back of every starship's consciousness for years. However, they quickly find that this mystery may have been better left unsolved, and that the Calliope is less of a dream or mirage and more of a terrible nightmare.Currently abandoned but who knows.
Relationships: James T. Kirk & Spock
Kudos: 4





	Olympus Falling

Earth was not much like Vulcan. The simple fact could have gone without saying, but every time Spock stepped foot on the loud, bright planet he couldn’t help but think it.

For the most part, Vulcan was fairly monochrome — dichromate or trichromatic if one counted tan and black in addition to the scorching reds of the Vulcan sands. The twin suns ensured a longer, harsher day. The atmosphere had nearly half the oxygen density as Earth’s, while the gravity was over twice that of the less dense “little marble.” To many humans Vulcan was oppressive and uninhabitable. His mother was a notable exception, having lived the last forty of her years on its surface when not accompanying her husband — his father — on diplomatic missions. On the other hand, Earth was all bright, shockingly blue sky and lush, verdant greens. The air was often too heavy and moist for Spock, and despite the fact that most of the humans he knew experienced some minor distress in the mid-summer heat of San Fransisco, he found it pleasant, if occasionally carrying a chill from the oceanfront.

The human at his side displayed no sign of the same mild stress he observed in those bureaucrats and “paper pushers” that flooded the courtyards of Starfleet Command. The Captain always seemed to operate at peak efficiency though, a fact Doctor McCoy seemed unduly annoyed by. It seemed very illogical to draw irritation from one’s commanding officer being physically fit, but maybe the doctor was experiencing jealousy. More likely, he was just complaining for the sake of complaining.

The Captain cast his eyes about restlessly. Spock briefly entertained that he looked almost trapped before Jim interrupted his thought by speaking.

“Spock, every time we have to come planet-side, I assume they’re going to try to pin an admiralty badge on me and tie me up in a corner office.”

The Captain had expressed this fear before, and Spock was want to have the same fear. Starfleet had expressed interest in taking command away from their most effective and most destructive captain for some years, and while Spock could see the logic, he absolutely could not accept it. While Jim did cause many incidents, and warrant more repairs to the _Enterprise_ than most other starships combine required, he had the lowest mortality rate among ship’s crew, had been integral in bringing several races into the Federation, and was regarded as a hero by many. Including every single one of his own crew. James Kirk would be a wonderful figurehead, but Spock thought he might as soon retire himself as see his Captain become part of the admiralty.

He settled for inclining his head in mock deference. “I am sure I would do a most admirable job of commanding the _Enterprise_ in your absence.” While Spock would never admit it as the joke that it was, his denial did not preclude the statement from having its intended effect. The Captain laughed, losing some of the restlessness that had settled over him since they had transported to the surface.

“Oh, I’m sure you would, Mister Spock. Tell me, who will you choose as your first officer when I’m Admiral Kirk?” He indulged the joke well, but Spock still saw the way he seemed to spit out the unwanted title. It did not sound right with his name.

Spock turned to follow the Captain into one of the more modern looking of the Command buildings, and he silently admired Terran architecture for being able to blend sharp lines and subtle curves so well. Sometimes, Vulcan architecture left much to be desired in terms of aesthetic. It was beautiful, but too austere. Maybe he had been among humans for too long, as his father said.  
“I believe that Mister Sulu would be a passable first officer. He demonstrates a healthy balance of restraint, respect, and rigidity.”

“Ah yes, the three Rs.” Jim said dryly as he held the door open to the large meeting area that their meeting would be taking place in. He followed Spock in and they took seats along the circular table on the side that faced the windows. Both men preferred to have their backs to the wall as a manner of defense. Plus, Jim liked to cloud watch, and the floor to ceiling windows of the opposite wall invited that occupation. “I think you should pick Bones, personally. It’s not logical, no,” he stopped Spock’s argument before it even truly formulated. “It’s not logical, but think of the constant second guessing! Why, to make a wrong decision you’d have to lose your hearing altogether.”

Captain Terrell sat beside Captain Kirk and picked up idle conversation as Spock considered the truth to that statement. Maybe he would never make a wrong decision, but that would primarily be because he would be constantly battling the ship’s surgeon — and in this theoretical, his second in command — for the logical high ground. He knew he typically had that high ground with the doctor, but through the doctor’s own illogic, he could not know that he did not have the high ground. As Spock contemplated a cloud that the Captain would have said looked like a fish, he took a second to feel grateful that the doctor had not been required at this meeting. The only person on the _Enterprise_ who hated the admiralty and bureaucrats more than the Captain was the ship’s doctor. “Soulless Denebian slime devils,” he called them, most likely recalling one of the many bad encounters with them that the _Enterprise_ and her crew had experienced in the past couple years.

As it was, Admirals Jones, Highcastle, and Bhadrev had taken up position directly across from Spock, under the dorsal fin of the fish-cloud. It was the discoid nature of the table that made the admirals look so small, Spock thought. Or maybe it was just that he surrounded himself with people who were, as the Captain would say, “larger than life.” Three carefully impassive admirals speaking among themselves in whispers were certainly not any larger than life. One admiral — Highcastle — turned to busy himself with the computer in front of him, but no light brightened his face or reflected in his eyes. Spock wondered why looking busy seemed to be such a high priority for humans, especially when it was so obvious that they were not as busy as they wanted to appear.

Captains Kirk and Terrell had evidently noticed as well, if their shared exasperation was any indicator. Though both of them were too tactful to sigh, Spock could feel the vague tiredness that seemed to fill the room the longer the admirals went without speaking.

Jim leaned over slightly and nodded to the window. “Doesn’t that cloud look like a large mouth bass, Mister Spock?”

“I had not put a species to it yet, Captain, but I admire your knowledge of cloud-based ichthyology.” Spock’s knowledge of Terran aquatic life was fairly weak, save for his interest in whales. Bass had many interesting aspects of their biology, but Spock found the sifting teeth and sung language system of whales fascinating.

Jim snorted, quieted by the pressures of command.

For the next forty-seven seconds, the room was silent but for the furtive movements of twenty Captain and First Officer pairs, and the inane chatter of the admiralty. When it was broken, Spock found himself feeling like the air had suddenly returned to the room. It was illogical, as neither atmospheric controls nor the atmosphere itself had wavered.

Highcastle stood from where he had been absently pressing the same area of his computer screen for the past five minutes. His hands rested at his sides for four seconds before he tucked them behind his back. That lasted for two seconds before he finally settled on crossing his arms over his chest in a defensive pose.

The next thirty-eight minutes were filled with vague niceties and clerical concerns. Captains made requests for new officers aboard ship, including Captain Kirk, who requested an officer whom he had mentioned to Spock. Starfleet Academy graduation had been the week prior, and new graduates were in demand from many ships. Spock suspected that one of the only reasons Jim actually endured these meetings was so that he could “poach” the top academy graduates and those he noted as showing some special skills. This was a contributing factor to the _Enterprise_ continuously being the most efficient and well-regarded ship in the fleet.

Like every other one of these yearly meetings, the admiralty spent most of the time after their opening remarks noting crew complement requests, “stirring the pot” about various incidents that had been reported throughout the year, and listening without any particular concern to the complaints of their command pairs. As always, the _Enterprise_ ’s command was noted in their relative silence. Though Spock would occasionally chime in with his encyclopedic knowledge of incident reports to clarify a detail that someone else had forgotten, and Jim often made quips to complement his friends’ reports and complaints, they both typically chose not to air their complaints at these meetings. They had found that they were rarely listened to, and that an audience just made ire grow among everyone.

When Spock noted the time, he wondered briefly if the human expression “time flies when you’re having fun” was more factual than he had previously thought. He was certainly not having any “fun,” and the hour they had been in this meeting appeared to be dragging. Spock was fancifully considering if it was possible that there was a localized time disturbance in the meeting space when each captains’ communicator began to beep with a certain sense of urgency. It was obvious that the urgency Spock felt was mirrored by everyone in the room. They would not all be called unless something dire was happening.

Spock stood with his captain as he moved away from the table, snapping open his communicator. Lieutenant Uhura’s voice had a certain amount of well contained panic in it. “Captain, ship’s sensors report that the… the _Calliope_ has just entered this star system, heading towards Earth at half impulse.”

Jim’s eyes snapped up to meet Spock’s. Everyone had just received the same information. Silence held in the room for a moment before Jim asked for Uhura to repeat her message. When it was the same — the _Calliope_ , Earth, half impulse, now only fifteen minutes away from Earth — Jim started going through the typical inquiries. They were not answering hails. Their deflector shields were on, and appeared to be modified, stronger even then modern shields. Weapons were armed, but what kind of weapons was unknown. The ship was not just drifting back to its port. Its movements were deliberate, and it didn’t slow no matter the hails. It could be assumed that the ship was hostile.

When the _Calliope_ had disappeared, both Jim and Spock had been crewmen on board their earlier assignments, Jim on the _Farragut_ and Spock aboard the _Enterprise_ under her previous captain, Christopher Pike. Both of their ships had reported to the incident, and the _Farragut_ had taken aboard the survivors. The _Enterprise_ had taken aboard those who did not survive the incident.  
The mystery of the _Calliope_ had been a topic of discussion for ten years now, as long as it had been missing. Four hundred and twenty-two out of four hundred and twenty-four crew on board left to float in space. Only eighty-one had been able to get on environmental suits before they had been abandoned. So, only eighty-one survivors were brought onto the _Farragut_. Captain Gallegoes and Lieutenant T’Pess had been the only among the crew not accounted for. Spock had known T’Pess in the academy. The woman had been the second full Vulcan to attend Starfleet Academy, and a very adept helmsman.

Countless expeditions had been undertaken in the past ten years to search for the _Calliope_ and its missing officers, and nothing had been uncovered save for one or two small trails of antimatter. It would have been easy to believe that perhaps Captain Gallegoes and Lieutenant T’Pess had marooned the crew for some unknown reason if there hadn’t been so many survivors. But then, the survivors’ stories were nearly impossible to believe. Every single survivor had reported an intruder interfering with ship’s systems, sabotaging communications systems, assuming control from auxiliary, beaming the crew en masse into space, not caring that most of the crew died the moment they materialized outside the ship. That story was outlandish, supposing an entire boarding party somehow made it onto the _Calliope_ and was able to take control of the ship. But then, all the survivors had report the same intruder. A humanoid figure with milky white eyes and dark skin, wearing rags and rage, and speaking in the same low, cruel voice. Though each account differed slightly, reflecting the variation in human memory, they were all incredibly similar, too much so to assume that they had all been wrong.

Of the eighty-one survivors, sixty had been admitted to rehabilitation services for varying degrees of space insanity, seventeen had retired with full honors, and only four had chosen to resume active duty. Only two were still active duty presently: Commander-now-Admiral Jonathan Highcastle, who now appeared to be in a state of complete shock and Ensign-now-Captain Kyle Towers, commanding officer on board the _Courage_. Captain Towers had been in attendance at this meeting, but Spock had seen him beam aboard his ship at the first mention of the _Calliope_. Perhaps attempting to live up to the name of his ship.

For his part, Jim only sent a hard glance when Admirals Jones and Bhadrev suggested that senior bridge officers wait to beam up until they had been briefed en masse. Hightower had sunk into his chair with a huff, and no one seemed to begrudge him his weakness. Spock thought that they were guilty of wanton insubordination as the meeting room dissolved away and was replaced with the transporter room of the _Enterprise_ , but he could not bring himself to cite regulation, partially due to the urgent nature of the approaching danger and partially due to his own misgivings about the wisdom of delaying assessment of what could be something very dangerous.

“It could be nothing,” the Captain said, apparently having some telepathy of his own. They had made their way to the turbolift, and they rose to the bridge rapidly. He sounded as if he was trying to convince himself.

Spock looked to his Captain, taking a moment to assess the tension in his shoulders, the way he clutched his hands tightly behind his back though they usually hung at his sides, the mark of confidence and ease in his own skin. “It could very well be, Captain.”

“Or,” Jim rocked back, letting his arms fall to his sides. He couldn’t allow himself even a modicum of the weakness that Highcastle had allowed himself. “It could be something.”

Spock nodded and allowed their eye contact to rest until the turbolift began to slow. He turned towards the door at the same time as the Captain. “Were I human, I believe I would wish it to be nothing.”

“I’ll wish for the both of us, my friend.”

They stepped onto the bridge together, greeted by the sight of the _Calliope_ filling the view screen.


End file.
